Art: Screens Against the Wind

Folding painted screens are an integral part of Japanese architectural
thought: they occupy a shadow line between architecture and decoration.
These delicate panels of rice paper stretched on lacquered frames, held
together by paper or leather hinges, were the remote ancestors of
today's plebeian room dividers and office partitions. Their name,
byōbu, means "protection from wind." From the 7th century, when the
first byōbu were introduced from China, the art of screen painting
absorbed the best talents in Japan. Perhaps because, being in everyday
domestic use, they were more liable to damage than...